It all started at 4 am on February 24, 2022. It was dark, loud, difficult, scary. The strikes in all the cities of Ukraine woke everyone up and made the heart beat faster. My mother ran into my room with the words “Daughter, get up, the war has begun.”
I will never and under no circumstances forget these mother’s words. Turning on the TV, our president announces “we are imposing martial law on the entire territory of our country.” After these words, it becomes even scarier, because you don’t know what to expect tomorrow, if this “tomorrow” will come at all. We Ukrainians hoped that someone would help us, we hoped that this would stop and we would continue to live in peace, but unfortunately this did not happen, every day the Russian Federation tried to destroy our country, our land, our people.
After spending Sundays in a cold and wet basement, hiding from the war, my family realized that we would not see a peaceful sky for a long time. The sounds of air alarms and flying missiles did not give rest. After the maternity hospital and school were destroyed in my place, my father decided to save the family and the future generation of people. As my father said, “we must save our child from this trouble, we must immediately take him out of Ukraine.”
The next morning, my mother and I gathered all the necessary things to leave for Poland. My dad took us to the Ukraine-Poland border. At that time, while we were traveling, many Ukrainians were also leaving. There were terrible traffic jams, we drove for a very long time. I was very worried that at this time, when we were going, Russian tanks would not come out of nowhere and that people would not be shot, as it had already happened and not for the first time. But thank God we reached the border, there was a long line of people, all women and children were crying for their husbands, fathers, brothers, as men do not have the right to leave in wartime. And then the time comes when, it’s our turn to cross the border, I hug my dad for the last time, my whole face is in tears, my soul is bad, my soul is sad. And the voice in my head “when will I see my dad next time?” It was our last goodbye. Everyone cried from great grief, my mother, my father, me.
Having crossed the border, already on the side of Poland, I turned and looked towards Ukraine, my dad was standing there in tears, I could not take my eyes off him and at this moment his words “I did it to save you and yours” sound in my head the future, because you are all I have left.” After arriving in Poland, volunteers from the border took us and took us to a camp where we can stay until they give us a new temporary home. In this camp, Polish volunteers fed us, gave us water, gave us clothes and shelter, for which we were very grateful. I was grateful to those people for not caring about us.
A month has passed since we lived in Poland and a miracle is happening here. My mother finds out that she is pregnant. And at that moment there were many emotions, joyful emotions from the fact that I will have a sister or a brother, and there were also unpleasant emotions about how to live further, how and where to give birth to a child. It was scary to return to Ukraine and give birth there, it was also scary to give birth in Poland, a completely foreign country, you don’t know the language, laws, or work. And we found a new solution: to go to my grandmother who lives in the United States. But we did not have a Green Card or Visa, so we decided to go through Mexico. At that time, a lot of Ukrainians got to the United States in this way. It was a long road, on April 19, 2022, we flew from the city of Warsaw to Amsterdam, there was a transfer to another flight: Amsterdam-Mexico. After arriving in Mexico City, we flew to the Mexico-United States border, the city of Tijuana, where we were met by Ukrainian volunteers who helped us cross the border. We arrived safely on foot in the territory of the United States. We ended up in San Diego. Ukrainian volunteers took us to a shelter where we were able to spend the night and eat. And the next day, we ordered tickets with my mother to New York, to my grandmother, who was waiting for us. We flew to New York on April 22, 2022. I wanted to spend a long time in this city, but I did not know that under the same circumstances I would end up in this city. On the one hand, I was happy because my dream came true, and on the other hand, I missed my hometown.
In this city, I started a new life, from scratch. Here I went to an American school, my education was very difficult for me, because I did not know the language, but I knew that I would overcome everything if it was not difficult. I had no friends, I was lonely. But I found a way out of this situation, I found a new hobby. I was very fascinated by this drawing and all the time I drew and created different pictures. Pictures gave me the meaning of a new life. I started posting these pictures on social networks, people really like how I draw. I am proud that I can create something special, unusual. Drawing gives me inspiration, I see life in bright colors. And I am very glad that I found myself in this business. And that’s why I want to continue this business and turn it into my dream job.
Regardless of how much I’ve been through, I still love my life and I’m proud that I’m improving it every day. Art always saves lives.
